Plant husbandry – Water culture – apparatus or method – Nutrient recirculation system
Patent
1999-02-10
2000-08-22
Jordan, Charles T.
Plant husbandry
Water culture, apparatus or method
Nutrient recirculation system
47 62A, 47 62N, A01G 3100
Patent
active
061053090
DESCRIPTION:
BRIEF SUMMARY
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
This invention relates to a method for growing plants and an apparatus for growing plants for hydroponic vegetables, flowers, grasses, and so forth using an artificial light source.
Furthermore, this invention relates to an improved cultivation apparatus and an improved cultivation method for growing plants very efficiently, in which a cultivation room is covered with a reflection layer, a fluorescent light is used as the artificial light source, and a pump forcibly blows air containing high density carbon dioxide gas into cultivation water solution in a cultivation container.
2. Description of Related Art
The several kinds of hydroponic cultivation apparatuses and methods for growing plants without using sunbeams and natural soil have been well-known.
The apparatuses, for example, have been found in an official gazette for Toku-Kai-Hei 7-50941, Toku-Kai-Hei 7-50929, Toku-Kou-Hei 6-61190, Toku-Kai-Sho 63-240731 developed by the present inventor, and Toku-Kai-Sho 62-55028.about.55029.
The above-described conventional embodiments are the apparatuses in which a fluorescent light is used as a light source of the hydroponic cultivation, the position of the fluorescent light is moved along with the growth of the plants, the distance between the upper portion of the plant and the position of the fluorescent light has been kept constant within the predetermined length.
However, in the hydroponic cultivation, especially for green vegetables, it has been a problem to cause a heat trouble. The heat trouble is a phenomenon in which a leaf is crinkled up and/or becomes black (chip-burn). It is very important that strong attention should be paid in order not to cause the chip-burn in the hydroponic cultivation because the commercial worth of the cultivation green vegetables becomes nothing if the part of the leaf, to say nothing of the whole leaf, has caused the chip-burn.
The hydroponic cultivation using an artificial light source, such as a high pressure sodium light or a metal halide light, producing a lot of heat energy usually causes the heat problem. Accordingly, the distance between the leaf and the light should be adjusted in order to avoid this kind of problem.
It has been considered that the chip-burn has been a phenomenon in which the surface of the leaf has been damaged because the heat energy of the artificial light source has been stored in the leaf surface and the radiation of the stored heat energy has not been done fully. The natural sunbeams would not cause the chip-burn, but the artificial light cultivation would cause the chip-burn.
Therefore, the chip-burn will be avoided if the heat radiation from the leaf surface will be made fully and the heat generation (especially radiant heat) will be made less by performing the high efficiency to contribute the plant growth by the artificial light.
According to the conventional apparatuses, a time (namely, night) has been given to stop irradiation by setting intermittently the irradiation time and/or blowing the cold air on the central portion of the plant. However, there have been defective points such as the complexity of facilities with the increase of the electric power consumption for blowing the cold air and a delay for growing the plants because of not making photosynthesis during the time when the irradiation has been stopped for setting the irradiation time.
There is an idea in which the plants receive the only visible rays through an optical fiber by eliminating heat rays contained in light emitted from the conventional light source (Toku-Kai-Hei 7-107868). However, this idea has not been realistic because a quantity of light has not been sufficient, a large number of optical fibers have been necessary to get a sufficient quantity of light, and the apparatus would be expensive and complex as a result.
Further, it has been considered that a sufficient quantity of oxygen has been necessary for growing a root. Thus, according to the conventional apparatuses, a several centimeters oxygen layer A has
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E.T. Harvest Co., Ltd.
Jordan Charles T.
Shaw Elizabeth
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